Never ridden one. Too many of my rockstar heroes died/nearly died that way, and frankly I've had bones broken by accident in my life and it is totally not fun.

However, the Crazy Bike Chase sequence of FF7 was the moment for me that it all seemed to crystalize into something more than the previous games had been. In a way, it's not that complicated a sequence, since the camera angle is fixed at a point directly behind Cloud's bike, and pans only as the road moves, but as is common for games I've played that come from the traditions FF7 was designed in, it is only deceptively simple.

The two types of Shinra Bike Attackers are doing the opposite of each other. It's basically like one of those Cake Factory type games, except some customers are asking for cakes to be made, and some customers are bringing you cakes.

It reminds me of reading about the concepts of emptiness and fullness in this book, which I checked out of the Davenport Main Public Library as a 7 year old...

Hey, they put Ninja Turtles in front of me, and Ninja Gaiden, and Final Fantasy, and Strider...

Who doesn't want to be a ninja? My dad told me they were thieves, and that it wasn't a good job to want, though, and later in life, my ex-father-in-law told me that while Pat Morita's character in The Karate Kid, Mr. Miyagi, said that "Karate is for defense only," there actually is the other side of the coin too, in that it is for killing.

This didn't mesh with my parents' peacenik ideals, which I share...

So I applied it to my video gaming, music, and general work attitudes. And FF7's Crazy Bike Chase is, to me, a basic ninja test.

I think that the bike chase scene in FF7 is heavily inspire by Akira, but I can't say that for sure. I do think Akira inspire a lot of media to come after it, especially because of the dystopian/city setting.

But yeah, last time I played FF7 and I saw Cloud ride up on the motorcycle during the cutscene, I just thought, "Damn, so Fckin cool." Then I wondered, why in the world did they give the other crew such a goofy looking three wheel car?